Hunters new to Northwest Colorado often opt to use a guide to familiarize themselves with the area's mountainous terrain. But many times that's the beginning of a long-term relationship that brings visitors back to hunt with the same outfitter year after year, said Tom Bowers, owner of Colorado High Lonesome Outfitter and Guides in Yampa, who sees repeat clients as the bulk of his hunting business outfitters these days.

Hunters flock to Colorado from all over the world during hunting season. They come to harvest pronghorn antelope, bears, mountain lions, deer and turkeys. They take in the legendary Rocky Mountain scenery and the ample stock of outfitting opportunities.

Just because you're not out hunting this fall doesn't mean you have to miss out on Northwest Colorado's plethora of opportunities to enjoy the great outdoors. With cooler weather, smaller crowds and the vibrant turning of the leaves, spectacular chances to hike, bike and visit local attractions in the fall is one of the region's best kept secrets.

Gina Grether is packing her bicycle and heading to France in a couple of weeks. She's flying across the Atlantic to compete in the world championships in "observed trials," a bicycle competition of precise, technical maneuvers over and around obstacles such as piles of logs and stacks of jagged rocks.

If carnival rides turn your stomach, farm animals aren't your gig and the mysteries of canned vegetables don't send you running for the exhibit hall, the Routt County Fair has a new and different opportunity to put you into the action this year.

Routt County's 4-Hers' animals are at the fairgrounds, the home arts exhibits are judged and displayed, and the carnival is up and running. With three days to go, the Routt County Fair is in full swing this weekend.

Groups come together to promote cultural, heritage tourism

A presentation about cultural and heritage tourism brought together historical societies from Yampa to Hahn's Peak, and various tourism advocates in between Thursday at the historic Hahn's Peak School.

Sharp declines in Colorado's funding for the arts have forced arts organizations to think differently, said Elaine Mariner, the newly appointed executive director of the state-funded Colorado Council on the Arts.

Construction in South Routt includes homes using straw bales and solar energy

These days, a drive through the neighborhoods of Oak Creek, Stagecoach and other rural reaches of South Routt County reveals that something alternative is going on. There are innovative new straw bale homes going up in Oak Creek and entire neighborhoods in Stagecoach using solar electricity.

Solas has undeniably deep Celtic roots, but when the band delves into its repertoire of Tom Waits, Bob Dylan, Nick Drake and Dan Fogelberg, it's hard to pigeonhole the sound as "traditional Irish." Still, alongside the Chieftans, Solas carries the torch as one of the oft-cited finest Celtic-folk ensembles around.

Every four years, the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition brings together young musicians from around the world to compete for cash prizes and concert engagements. The competition in Fort Worth, Texas, is regarded as the most prestigious classical piano contest in the world.

Photographer Epperson points his camera toward patterns

Whether it's a cityscape or a Yampa Valley landscape, Dave Epperson's photography captures crisp, fleeting images of people and places that draw you in and make you want the details of their unfolding stories.

To bring Oak Creek into compliance with Federal Emergency Management Agency floodplain restrictions and protect the town's certification for the National Flood Insurance Program, the Oak Creek Town Board approved a bid Thursday night to spend about $2,000 to have Landmark Consultants engineer a floodplain study for the Arthur Avenue neighborhood.

Galactic is a New Orleans-based band that melds jazz, funk, rock, blues and a whole lot of imagination into its notably organic jam sessions. The sextet plays cool, modern music with a groove that the New York Times called "some of the most danceable music on Earth."

Norman Foote got his musical start on a guitar from the Sears catalog. He got his sense of humor from the fate of his given name: Norman Mervyn Barrington-Foote. Born with a name like that, Foote said, he was forced to develop a sense of humor at an early age -- and by the time he turned 20, he was pursuing comic theater full time.

South Routt residents join opera stars on stage in production of "La BohÃme"

Emerald City Opera's performance of Giacomo Puccini's "La BohÃme" is headlined by opera singers from such illustrious international companies as the Metropolitan Opera, The Santa Fe Opera, Chicago Opera Theater, Cairo Opera and New York Opera. It is complemented by a chorus of area singers and musicians who auditioned for their roles and have spent grueling weeks preparing for them.

The secret's out: Billy Kidd doesn't take his hat off at the dinner table.
Kidd, in his cowboy hat, along with Jim "Moose" Barrows and Jenny O'Farrell, judged the Steel Chef culinary competition that was the entertainment highlight of the Steamboat Wine Festival's "Wine on the Mountain Grand Tasting" Friday night at the top of the gondola. The winner of the 2004 Steel Chef competition was Kate VanRensselaer and Aaron Thompson from Cafe Diva, taking the honors with kung pao shrimp over a forbidden rice cake, sauteed shrimp with mole verde and seafood crepes.

Zimbabwean thumb piano featured in festival

The Colorado Grass Roots Music Festival features more than 20 Colorado bands and solo performers playing "unplugged" at State Bridge Lodge this weekend. The lineup includes rock, blues, alternative, folk and Celtic -- and the melodic sounds of the Zimbabwean thumb piano.

During a Galactic show, it's hard to pinpoint whether the New Orleans-based band is playing jazz, funk, rock, blues or some other eclectic musical manifestation. But rest assured, there's always a whole lot of groove going on.

Steamboat Springs photographer Steve West's home is filled with brilliant images of white bog orchids, wild geraniums and high alpine columbine. The images of petals and leaves are magnified tenfold and more, yet they retain the most minute botanical details.

In 1969, Burning Spear, aka Winston Rodney, consulted with his neighbor, Bob Marley, about how to get started in the music business. Thirty-one years and more than 30 albums after Marley gave Spear his personal advice while sauntering along a country road in St. Ann's Parish in Jamaica, Spear won a Grammy for best reggae album.

There's a lot of comedy, tragedy and passionate emotion to be had when you mix a poet, an artist, a philosopher and a musician who are leading free-spirited lives undaunted by cold, hunger or the misadventures of poverty. Add a couple of girlfriends and the story only can be enriched by the promise of romance, jealousy and heartache.

To play an authentic Mozart opera, Vivaldi, Bach or Handel's "Messiah," you must have a harpsichord, Hayden piano tuner and restorer Kathleen Allen said. This was a realization many musicians made in the 1950s, at the start of the harpsichord revival movement.

New Home ReSource center protects landfill by deconstructing, recycling buildings

Brett KenCairn and David Epstein have visions of biodiesel filling stations, green construction and alternative energy options for the Yampa Valley dancing in their heads. They envision community-based solutions for globally sustainable living under the umbrella of their latest brainchild, the Yampa Institute for Land and Community.

Fire department to battle propane tree

There's no need to alert the fire department to the blazing hot, 50-foot flames you will see shooting into the sky Monday evening in Yampa. It's the Yampa fire department that will be lighting the fire.

In a prelude to Emerald City Opera's presentation of "La BohÃme" Aug. 6 and 8 in the Steamboat Springs High School auditorium, the opera company is making itself available to answer all your wildest opera questions.